Study: Pacifiers prevent babies from expressing their emotions

Parents against using pacifiers now have another weapon in their arsenal should they wish to impose their lifestyle choices on others. A recent study has found that parents may have a hard time reading a baby’s emotions if the infant is constantly sucking on a piece of rubber that blocks the mouth.

“Smiles of infants using a pacifier were also rated as less happy than smiles depicted without a pacifier,” the study found. “The same pattern was observed for expressions of distress: adults rated infants presented with pacifiers as less sad than infants without pacifiers.”

A related study found in 2012that babies who use pacifiers are limited in their ability to mimic the emotions they see in their parents and other adults.

Parents, do you let your children use pacifiers? You might want to check and see if your babies are expressing any of the emotions in the slideshow above.